The Home for Odd, Ugly and Neglected Toys

Now THIS is what I’m talking about! All you blog readers out there take notice. Last week marked a true sign of reader generosity.

Out of the blue, one of the blog readers, “Mistuh_Thye,” contacted me informing me that he’d found some cool toys. He thought I’d enjoy them for my collection and website, so he wanted to send them to me.

Awesome.

I’ve had this kind of thing happen with friends and family but never with a total stranger. I’m always really grateful for all the thoughts and kind gestures, but unfortunately, a lot of the toys i get from folks don’t really “make the cut” in my undefinable sense of weirdness (Yeah, I’m an ass. Sorry.).

So, out of the kindness of his heart, Mistuh_Thye sent me a couple of weirdo toys… and not only that, they were WEIRD! Wow! That really meant a lot. Thanks so much. Not only did I get some cool, free toys, but they are actually good ones. 😀

When I first got the message from Mistuh_Thye, I was a bit weary. Seriously. This is a total stranger that could be sending me anthrax in the mail or something. But, for some reason, I trusted him. Thanks Mistuh_Thye. You’re the best. (As a sidenote, I wanna let you all know that Mistuh_Thye likes to collect Hillbilly themed toys and stuff, so if you have any cool items to share, maybe you can drop him a line.)

Well, enough Mistuh_Thye ass-kissing, let’s see the toys.

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First we have this awesome and generic karate-terminator-barbarian kind of guy. I’m not sure not sure what toyline he’s from. He has no markings (none that I could see anyway. I didn’t strip him down 100%).

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The first thing I noticed is his torn face revealing his cyborg skull. A classic gimmick reminiscent of the old Terminator movie. It’s funny to see all the detail in the cyborg eye socket, but his other eye is simply a black dot. What the hell.

Next, I noticed he’s outfitted in a cloth, black karate uniform (properly referred to as a “gi”). This reminded me of the Karate Defenders toyline. But then, I noticed his body is a generic mold taken from the classic Masters of the Universe toyline (yep, another one). He has the same torso, arm and hand poses, etc. The only thing “weird” was his legs.

So with a little bit of “research” online and a bit of info from a newly found toy buddy of mine (thanks for the tips Justin), I was lead to a toyline called “Combo Heroes.” These figures look like the classic MOTU figures and come equipped with vest, shield and weapons.

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In these pics I found, you can see the cyborg face guy. He’s definitely different from the one I’ve featured here. Who knows? There are so many bootlegs and bootlegs of bootlegs out there, what I have here is probably some messed-up homemade custom. Fortunately, it found a home on my shelf 😀

If anyone has some good info on the origin of this figure, please share. I’d love to know what this toy is. Until then, I’ll call him Karate Cyborg.

Next we have this odd Hulk head Madball wannabe.

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He looks cool enough as is. Just an odd Marvel Comics’ decapitation toy. The toy is rubbery and squishy, and when you squeeze him…

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… he vomits a giant ball of slime containing a single fist and a brain.

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Huh?

So, either he’s eaten someone recently and decided to cough things up, or these floating bits are supposed to be symbolic of the Hulk’s inner rage and the dual-minded intelligence of his alter-ego, Bruce Banner.

Or it could be I’m over-thinking it. It’s just a goofy, gross toy. Great!!

I have a detail that might help out with karate ninja based on some of your findings. lets just say, based on the part of town that the garage sale was in, there is a pretty good possibility that this is a Mexican bootleg

@ Mistuh_Thye – Yeah. I hope you don’t mind being in the Weirdo Toys spotlight for a bit. I really appreciate your sending these things my way. Thanks for the tip on the potential Mexican origins of the Karate Cyborg figure too.

Kindred Spirits

Who is Weirdo Toys?

I’m Justin Gammon. I'm a designer/illustrator by day and toy-blogger by night. That'll explain my sporadic postings. What do you mean you want to write to me? That's odd. Hey, while you're at it, would you send me some cool toys? Thanks!